Thesis Abstract

Venice: Nostalgia and the Migropolis

       They say everyone wants to possess the city of Venice. To see it, to conceive it, to judge it, to buy a small piece of it; so much that it has quite arguably become a perversion of sorts. No longer is Venice the fragile isolated jewel jealously admired by its natives, but rather a minute representation of the effect of industrial development and globalization. The city, once an impressive commercial Republic, physically tied itself to terra firma (via a bridge) in an effort to assimilate itself to the only feasible model of development, consequentially forcing Venice to concentrate its uses and activities, thus establishing an iconic tourist destination. 

               Today, Venice has become the ‘global city’ where two rivers meet and collide- one driven by pleasure and amusement, and the other portraying all too real paths of emigration and need. As Plato once said, ‘for indeed any city, however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the other of the rich; these are [constantly] at war one another; such is the case of war within Venice.  Plagued with over 7 million tourists per year, Venice is feared to have turned into a museum of culture and a perversive all too real Disneyland, meanwhile its residents flee to the mainland in search of economical and daily stability. In effect, Venice has gradually lost its ability to represent itself through its territory (the lagoon) and has arguably ceased to understand itself as a metropolitan system. 

               What is the Venice for the modern man?  Should Venice the zeropolis continue to exploit herself as the ultimate destination of our urban experiments, or become, rather to return as the commercial centre of culture, knowledge and ecology of the Adriatic? Perhaps, it would be best to let Venice, the fish, swim away once more. Nonetheless, this thesis therefore concerns itself with the transversality of the urban territory of Venice subjected to the conditions of globalization and seeks to solve the contradictions of the city: richness and poverty, massive tourism and the escape of inhabitants, and a city for living versus the place for passing through. It seeks to understand the nostalgic Venice living in memories not forgotten, in order to provide an opportunity for its rebirth.